We’re all in favor of affordable and quality home care for Michigan citizens in need of help at home, and it is reassuring a very significant amount of those services are provided by family members and personal friends.

Michigan ballot Proposal 4 is about the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) tapping Michigan Medicaid funds for millions of public dollars.

It is unclear exactly how the SEIU would serve a largely disparate group of people helping family members and friends … or why those helpers should pay union dues just because the money (Medicaid) comes from the taxpayers.

Home health care-giving is usually a very private matter. The providers are not likely to benefit in any reasonable manner by paying dues into a union that cannot possibly connect in a meaningful way with a widespread and highly informal and personal constituency. Making it mandatory that home health care providers are unionized “public sector employees” is not necessary.

We don’t need a reprise of the onerous program introduced by our previous governor’s regime, during which the SEIU collected $30 million public dollars … for what?

The current administration successfully eliminated that drain. Hence, it became one of the target reforms that special interests are trying to wipe out in the upcoming election.

It’s bad enough when such legislation is heavily financed by relatively narrow constituencies with a huge financial interest in the outcome. We are really in trouble if the laws of the land can be fixed in our constitution by public popularity campaigns.

These are challenging, tough and often confusing times. Here’s a certainty: It is not a time to start rewriting the constitution. We advocate a “no” vote on Proposal 4.

Editorial opinions are the consensus of The Daily News editorial board.

Carl Paepke, 86, of Pierson, died Wednesday. The longtime Montcalm County commissioner did not, in fact, die Saturday, as was previously reported in several rounds of emails throughout Montcalm County. Another Montcalm County commissioner, Ron Baker, was with a cousin of a friend who was with Mr. Paepke’s daughter Saturday. Baker said the friend who was with Mr. Paepke’s daughter texted information to the cousin stating Mr. Paepke had died. And so an unfortunate chain reaction began.

We are more than a little disappointed that yet another recall effort is in the works, this one in Belding. At issue, is the Board of Education’s decision to privatize the district’s custodial services to a third-party vendor at the recommendation of their administration and after months of study. The decision was not made lightly and in the end the district will save an anticipated $802,000 over a three-year period. That is not chump change and in the environment the district finds itself in with declining enrollments, it likely is only the first of many such moves that will be needed to right the finances of the system. Transportation and sports may not be far behind.